Top 1000 Library Books
Found this link at Crooked Timber. Not only does the OCLC have a top 1000 list, but it also has this dramatically deep ISBN listing that’s fun to surf. Say you were scrolling through the list and you stopped at number 50 which happens to be Shakespeare’s "The Tempest." You plug in your zip code to get a list of the several nearby libraries that have it available for you. Fine, but "The Tempest" has about eleven dozen editions and the OCLC has a tidy ISBN listing that’s a grab-bag of surprises. Clicking through the ISBNs you run across a lot of critical commentary and then SURPRISE! Here’s a recording by a lot of Redgraves! I mean — it’s not a poodcast or something… you still have to check it out of the library, but how cool is this? Very. No doubt.